Banknotes were originally IOUs for gold deposits held at the Bank of England. People used them to pay for things safe in the knowledge that they were backed by the promise to pay the equivalent value in gold.
This confidence in banknotes is important for keeping the whole economy functioning. It is for this reason that we work hard to ensure that banknotes are high quality, durable and difficult to counterfeit.
Our banknotes are designed to be difficult and time consuming to copy. We work closely with De La Rue, the company that currently prints our banknotes, to ensure that new banknotes are of a uniformly high quality.
There are currently four denominations (values) of circulating Bank of England note: £5, £10, £20 and £50. Every note has a unique serial number.
Our current £5 and £10 notes are printed on polymer.
Our current £20 and £50 are printed on paper. Our next £20 note, to be issued in early 2020, will be made from polymer. We announced in October 2018 that we are going to issue a polymer £50 note, which we expect to enter circulation by the end of 2021.
Legal tender’ is a term that people often use, but when it comes to what can or can’t be used to pay for things, it has little practical use.
Legal tender has a very narrow and technical meaning, which relates to settling debts. It means that if you are in debt to someone then you can’t be sued for non-payment if you offer full payment of your debts in legal tender.
What is classed as legal tender varies throughout the UK. In England and Wales, legal tender is Royal Mint coins and Bank of England notes. In Scotland and Northern Ireland, only Royal Mint coins are legal tender. Throughout the UK, there are some restrictions when using the lower value coins as legal tender. For example, 1p and 2p coins only count as legal tender for any amount up to 20p.
In October 2018, we announced we are going to issue a new polymer £50 note. The scientist Alan Turing will feature on the new note, which we expect to enter circulation by the end of 2021. Turing was chosen using our character selection process.
